Evan Rosa: For the Life of the World is a production of the Yale Center For Faith and Culture. Visit us online at faith.yale.edu. This episode was made possible in part by the generous support of the Tindale House Foundation. For more information, visit tindale.foundation.

Jamie Tworkowski: I like the idea of inviting. People into the possibility that that life is already worth living. Doesn't mean life is already easy or fun or happy, but that it is worth it to stay. I tend to think a lot about surprises and, and hope, or opportunity or possibility or change showing up as a surprise. I think about every time I've fallen in love, that was never on a whiteboard. It was never, you know, it was, it was never a moment that I orchestrated. All these moments were surprises. And I, and I love the idea of encouraging people to stay for the surprises. And they don't all have to be big or impressive, you know, but just that we would have these reminders that man, I'm so glad I stayed for that.

I, I didn't see that coming. You know, I, I was surprised by life.

Evan Rosa: This is For the Life of the World, a podcast about seeking and living a life worthy of our humanity. I'm Evan Rosa, with the Yale Center For Faith and Culture. As we're knit in the womb, a primal cry emerges from the very fact of our being, the very fact of our dependence. The very fact of our contingency, the fact of our ultimate need: do you love me?

But as we grow in wisdom and stature, and experience the profound meaning of human community and common life together, a new cry also emerges: do you know me?

And so the curtain is pulled back on at least one aspect of our nature and a clue is offered for our purpose: to be known and loved.

But of course, that's the passive voice. And it's essentially so in this case, implying that we must receive this love from outside of us and we must be beheld and known by another. Today on the podcast, Jamie Tworkowski joins me for a conversation on knowing and loving in a life worth living, and not just a life worth living in a sense of flourishing that we commonly use throughout the podcast, but a life worth living when survival itself is a question; when the pain becomes too much to bear; when the clouds block out the stars and the light of hope is faint, if it's even there at all.

Jamie is the founder of the nonprofit organization To Write Love On Her Arms and is the bestselling author of If You Feel Too Much: Thoughts on Things Found and Lost and Hoped For. Together, we talk about the hope and resilience and human identity that emerges from being known and loved: what it means to live a life worth living; his own struggle with mental illness and therapy; the connection between mystery, not knowing and the sort of surprise that makes life worth another day. Please also be aware that we talk in some detail about the beautiful and heartbreaking founding story that led Jamie to start To Write Love On Her Arms, which includes references to self harm and contains an expletive, which in Jamie's words is more about identity than profanity.

And if you or anyone, you know, is struggling with thoughts of suicide, self harm, or if you just need help even right now, call or text 988. 988 is the new nationwide number for the suicide and crisis lifeline. Thanks for listening today, friends. Be well.

Jamie, thanks so much for joining me on For the Life of the World.

Jamie Tworkowski: Oh, thank you for having me.

Evan Rosa: Let's just cut right to it. When you think about your identity as a human being, when you strip away all the dinner party chit chat or airplane mode, talking to a stranger, who are you?

Jamie Tworkowski: Holy moly, that's a good question. Oh my gosh. I think I'm maybe like a lot of people in a season of trying to answer that question. It's good to directly be asked that question cause it does challenge you to come up with an answer, not just for a podcast, but for my soul. So I mean, obviously that can be unpacked a lot of ways.

I'm a son. I'm a big brother. I'm an uncle. I'm a dog dad to the little sleeping pup next to me. I grew up a Christian and hold it looser than I used to. I think, claim to have less figured out than I used to. I'm a surfer. I'm a Enneagram Four, which means we love being Enneagram Fours. I'm a feeler, I've always been pretty sensitive. I'm in therapy. I struggle with depression. So those are a few answers.

Evan Rosa: From that space that you just described. I wonder if you would talk about what it means to be a spiritual person these days.

Jamie Tworkowski: Yeah, I think, oh, that's another good question. It's weird. I, I feel like I fall into the deconstruction camp, but I'm not actively deconstructing.

I feel like I've just put so much of it on the back burner. And yet there's a ton of not just muscle memory--I still feel connected to how I grew up, the language. And I, I, I still believe in a loving God. I still believe in the idea that I've been created to be known and loved and to be in relationships that mirror that. That remains kind of my lens or my worldview.

I have so many "I don't knows" that I wonder if, if maybe eventually I'll wanna wrestle with, with finding some clarity in some of those areas, but I think I can't shake the idea that I, I still believe in a loving God. And, even even a, maybe a God that would be bummed out by the things that bum me out in American politics or the way that marginalized people are treated.

So I feel like, I think about it less or certainly have less clarity, but I still, I don't know. I, I think some of those moments I would, maybe I found growing up in church, I think I find them or even look for them elsewhere, you know, in, in surfing or at a concert or when a movie speaks to me.

I don't know, Bono had a quote I read a long time ago that he, he felt like he snuck outta church and went drinking with God. And I'm, I'm not much of a drinker, but I just like that idea, that you could take God with you or that God would want to come with you no matter where, you know, no matter, no matter how far you wander.

Evan Rosa: Well you said something that I was meaning to ask anyway, but this knowing and loving, I wanted to park a little bit on this for a little while. You talk about this quite a bit in your writing. So I want to just to ask you, when it comes to being known, being loved, each of those are like passive, right? Like being known by another, being loved by another, even if there is an active giving, you know, that we offer: the knowing of another person to that other person or loving that other person. For you what's the connection between being known and being loved?

Jamie Tworkowski: You, you are on a roll with these questions! That--it's so good!

I, I definitely, I, I do tend to, I didn't say it this way just now, but I, I definitely love the idea of both: you know, of, of being in relationships where it's reciprocated, like where both of those go two ways: that I can know and love another person and I get to be known and loved by another person. The first thought that comes to mind is like, for someone to love me, how that plays out or shows up will probably look like wanting to know me because, because to love me, I think would mean to participate in my life and you can't do that without knowing me. And some of this is informed by like recent heartache and transition and recent relationships changing. Maybe I have subconsciously been preparing for this question, but I've always been someone who I value being asked questions, and I think it's just such an easy barometer for, if someone cares about me, they're gonna ask about my life, whether they're big questions or not, whether it's just something simple about my day, that that's always been something that helped me feel cared for. And so I, I think, and maybe I'm someone who enjoys asking questions of the people that I care about.

Evan Rosa: Does either take priority for you; the, the knowing or the loving?

Jamie Tworkowski: That's a good question. I mean, I think we, I think maybe we hear more about love, you know, song, more songs are written about the love part than the knowing part. I think I've come to value the knowing, that maybe they do go hand in hand. I think I'm, I'm part of this is informed by a recent relationship where I feel like I'm aware that someone cares about me, but I'm being given crumbs. And, and it's actually a relationship where I've noticed that I'm not being asked questions. And it feels like distance and it feels like being kept at a distance. And so it's, I think we're all, you know, I'm someone who loves love, romantic love and otherwise. And, and again, I think as a society, that's where we focus and that it's, it's fun to think about love and learn about it, read about it.

But I think I've really come to value that being loved looks like being known, if that makes sense. That that, or that being known is an, can be an act of love or can be what love looks like and, and feels like. I think too, in a, in a moment in time where a lot of people value being known as it relates to social media or followers or influence or a blue check mark, I've, I've come to embrace the irony that I don't actually need to be known by a thousand people or even a hundred people.

But I do need a few people who know me, like a few real honest, vulnerable relationships. So I, I, I find that kind of fascinating because because so much emphasis is placed on influence and tens of thousands of followers. And what does that mean? And is that a, a valuable life or a successful life and kind of the, I don't know if it's irony, but just the idea that many people maybe don't even have a few people who truly know us.

Evan Rosa: Yeah. It's interesting how each of those, the being known and the being loved, I'm just thinking off the top of my head about it right now, too, the perversity of the worst ways that those might be popularized in the world. They all stem from this really primal cry of an individual person to be known and to be loved.

And yet, the expression ends up in a kind of like desire for fame or the expression ends up in a kind of, I don't know if it's codependency or like looking for love in all the wrong places or, or what. But, but it's, it's tied to a deep part of our human identity, which is built, built deeply into us, around the desire for that.

Jamie Tworkowski: I agree, and some of it, it, it just, I think it feels healthy to name it. And, and maybe as you pointed out, maybe I, without realizing it, I, I do say it and write it and, and kind of name it a lot. And I also think, you know, sometimes people will literally ask me, especially someone struggling or someone in crisis to the point of wondering if life is worth living, it could even be as simple, or not simple, but as short as like an Instagram comment: what's the point of all this? Why am I here?

And without pretending to know the story of their life. I, I do love believing that beyond vocation, beyond circumstance, hey, we're all here to be known and loved and, and, and to get to know and love some other people. And even the mystery of can I be known and loved by God? Does, does God love me? Does God desire to know me? But that everything else can be secondary like vocation, and you know, other relationships? I don't know. So.

Evan Rosa: Or success.

Yeah. Totally, I guess it's the closest I come to: what's the meaning of life, you know? Or why, why are we here? Why should someone stay alive?

Jamie Tworkowski: Yes. I was gonna ask you this toward the end, but one of the, one of the things we do at the Yale Center For Faith and Culture is we we've developed a course that was initially taught at Yale College for Yale undergrads. And the course is called A Life Worth Living.

Cool.

Evan Rosa: When you consider that phrase, a life worth living, what is a life worth living?

Jamie Tworkowski: Yeah. Wow. Uh, I know that I desire to live a life that I believe in. I, I know that I desire to live a life in relationship, which does come back to being known and loved. I want to love my family, my parents, my sisters, my nephews, my friends. I desire to find a partner someday, you know, to find a romantic relationship and, and maybe to have a family of my own someday.

I do believe, and I've told this, I've shared this with people, especially people who are struggling. I believe that is worth life living regardless of circumstance. There's a quote I stumbled upon, I found it in maybe an odd, somewhat surprising place. It was an article in the Guardian about climate change. I don't remember who said the, the statement, but the sentence was hope is a commitment to the future.

And I like that, especially as someone who gets associated with hope and has written about hope, I like that it took it out of the realm of circumstance and emotion and something to be found in a favorite song or a sunset, but this idea that I could commit to the future, regardless of what it looks like and feels like.

So I think it's a miracle that we get to live life in the context of other people, you know, that we do get to be known and loved by other people, we get to be in relationship. We also get to wrestle with what it looks like to be in a relationship with our Creator. And then I think, I, I know that I want, I wanna make an impact.

I have a friend who's really successful. He's a really successful actor. He's one of my favorite people. And he always talks about being of service. And he really means it. It's not a PR thing. He does live that way. He's, he's just thoughtful and generous and intentional. And so I, I love the idea of, of borrowing that of, of hoping that I can be of service. Wanting to make an impact, wanting to be an encouragement. But I think, I think maybe 10 years ago, I, I valued things that seemed big. I wanted to speak at conferences and meet cool people and, you know, be connected to people of influence. And I think I've come to really appreciate the small: getting coffee with my best friend who I grew up with and being close to my mom and watching my nephews grow up. And I like the idea of, of valuing both. I wanna make an impact, but I also want to have these individual relationships and moments that I value as well.

Evan Rosa: Yeah. How do you apply it? I wanna move a little bit into mental health and, and in some of your past work, how do you apply that question of, of the fact that life is worth living? How do you communicate it and how do you place it in the context of mental health, where to the person suffering, life doesn't seem to be worth living?

Jamie Tworkowski: Yeah, I've really come to believe that getting help, asking for help, recovery counseling for some people, sobriety, that it's not easy, but it's worth it.

And so I love to invite people into that idea. And I, and I say that from experience, not that I'm experienced in every mental illness or every mental health struggle, but as someone who has struggled with depression and continues to, and someone who's been in counseling on and off for a lot of years, and, and with my current counselor for the last four or five years, I'm thankful to not just talk about these things, hypothetically, but hopefully to, to lead or speak from a place of vulnerability as someone who needs help. And even as someone, if I get invited to go speak somewhere, I think oftentimes I, I feel like I'm talking to myself or I'm saying things that I need and maybe even, and, and even kind of operating from a deficit, like saying things that I wish people would offer me.

I don't know. I love the idea that it wouldn't have to be so much about circumstance or success or making a certain amount of money and, and inviting people into those possibilities. But the idea that life is already worth living and, and your healing is worth pursuing your recovery, whatever that means, whatever that looks like, for however long it takes, is worth it. And you deserve people who remind you of that truth. You deserve people who, not that they take the place of a counselor, but they wanna walk alongside you as you heal and recover. And I think often in relationships will, will take turns. We'll trade places. Sometimes we get to be the concerned friend and sometimes we're the friend in need of help.

So I hope that's something people can rest in. And so I like the idea of inviting people into the possibility that life is already worth living. Doesn't mean life is already easy or fun or happy, but that it is worth it to stay. And I, I, I tend to think a lot about surprises and, and hope or opportunity or possibility or change showing up as a surprise.

I think about every time I've fallen in love or had a crush on someone, that was never on a whiteboard. It was never, you know, it was, it was never a moment that I orchestrated and I think that's true--I mean, when I had job opportunities or found out my book was a best seller, like all these moments were surprises, and I, and I love the idea of encouraging people to stay for the surprises.

And they don't all have to be big or impressive, you know, but just that we would have these reminders that man, I'm so glad I stayed for that. I, I didn't see that coming. You know, I, I was surprised by life.

Evan Rosa: Yeah. I mean, I'm connecting here with something that you said earlier about, you know, being in an, "I don't know," phase of life.

I think that is true of so many people. Hits everybody in different ways into different degrees, but I can't help but notice the same kind of promise kind of on offer in, in the concept of surprise. Right. It's it, it really kind of digs into that ignorance or the not knowing of saying, oh, we, we, we don't know.

It's the kind of unfolding of mystery almost. This is, this is a mystery, you were put here, and it's up to you if you want to try to solve it or not. If you want to be surprised by what comes next. And I think there's this kind of the, like a love for the unknown. Yeah. There's this song by this old band called Clem Snide, "I Love the Unknown," and my wife showed it to me when we were first dating. I was always intrigued by that, "I love the unknown," it's like, I don't know about that. And it really crosses with this whole thing. Well, the point is to be known, the point is to be loved. And the point is to be like in this knowing relationship, and yet we're kind of always beckoned or maybe even taunted by the unknown as well. I mean, I, as somebody who struggles with depression and wanting very much, the kind of healing, I, I, I just wonder if it's, if that tension does anything for you there.

Jamie Tworkowski: Yeah. And I think too, it's tempting to want control, you know, in, in so many parts of life, but certainly as it relates to maybe our pain, our grief, you know, for me, I'm 42 and single, and I, I didn't expect to be 42 and single, I, I thought I would be married and, and, you know, have kids by now.

And, and so as much as there's things I have to be thankful for. There, there, there's this certain reality of, you know, there's pain there. There's, there's regret and confusion and uncertainty, but I think I'm intrigued by this like a healthy level of detachment and, and there's so many cliches or simple truths of like, "today is all we have, this moment is all we have."

And I think trying to, to learn how to live there and to live with gratitude, like to, to, I kind of stumbled upon this phrase, the idea that there's much not missing. It's easy and it's tempting, especially in light of what I just said. It's easy to stare at what's missing every day and for all of us, not just for me, just broken relationships, someone that we lost, you know, and, and so I think just trying to live in this place, not in like a cheesy or fake way, but like a genuine gratitude for life; I'm healthy. I can breathe today. I can maybe go surfing this afternoon. I can walk my dog this evening. And trying to give up not just control in general, but I, I think, especially as someone who's, who does struggle with depression, who's learning about codependency, this, the freedom that can be found in realizing I can't control anyone else feels like a big one at the moment.

And so trying to let go of that illusion and trying to adjust expectations and realize, and believe that there's there's peace and healing and happiness and freedom to be found there. And, and I can only do this thing one day at a time. I can only do my best. I do have access to love and connection and relationship, even in the absence of romantic love.

Evan Rosa: Give us a little context. So a lot of people know your work through To Write Love On Her Arms. And so I'm wondering if you could tell me a little bit about what that phrase means to you still today? I know it's historical. I know it comes from this piece that wrote in 2006. And I wonder if you would just say a little bit about what those words still mean to you?

Jamie Tworkowski: Yeah. So for people who don't know, "To Write Love On Her Arms" was the name of a story that I wrote in 2006. It was a true story about getting to know a friend, a new friend who was struggling with the issues that the organization now speaks to. So depression, addiction, self injury and suicide. You could expand that today to eating disorders, anxiety, and kind of this big picture question of what do we do with our pain.

It was a phrase that I had written and it actually related to the night that I met my friend, Renee. She, after I met her, uh, my friends and I drove away with the understanding that one friend could pick her up the following morning to take her into treatment. She ended up taking a razor blade to her forearm and wrote the word "fuck up" across her forearm. And I, I've told this story a lot and I, I think it's important to say that I think that moment was about identity, not profanity. And that, you know, for her, there was regret, there was sorrow, there was a feeling of failure. There was so much wrapped up in that moment.

And I think we can, people get shocked by the profanity, uh, and the self-harm aspect, but I think we can all relate to the identity part. To maybe waking up to a moment of like, how is this my life? How, how, how is this my reality? How did I get here? It became the name of an organization and that organization, really, the story went viral.

I, I sold some t-shirts to help pay for her treatment and, and the t-shirts kind of took on a life of their own. And, and 16 years later, it's a, an organization that's doing really well. That that is really thriving and continues to bring hope and resources to people all over the world.

I transitioned out last summer. So what do I feel now? I, I feel proud of it. I feel grateful. I, I remember early on the feeling that, that phrase at first, it was a, a goal for one person and pretty quickly because of this growing audience, it became a goal on a bigger scale. You know, the idea that, essentially the title, what it meant was trying to replace what my friend had marked on her body and, and trying to believe that she deserved better.

She deserved healing. She deserved sobriety, redemption, recovery. She deserved to believe that she was loved, and to able to let that replace that word on her, her arm. And that was, that was a goal for Renee back when it started and very quickly and, and still today it's a goal for, you know, whoever might encounter, not just the story, but now the organization, it feels it, you know, I'm proud of having a hand in creating something that is now so much bigger than me that has, has touched a lot of people.

I, I get to meet people who say they're still alive because of it. Or they ended up in counseling or treatment because of it. And it does feel like a, you know, we talked earlier about a healthy detachment and it feels, it feels like that. Cause I, I feel separate from it. I'm aware that may, I don't have any kids, but I imagine it's maybe like having a kid that you're proud of and, and you're aware that kid is autonomous and separate from you, but you're just thankful that that life is connected to your life.

And I'm, I'm, I continue to cheer them on. My sister is one of the executive directors. My mom is the bookkeeper. My best friend is, is pretty high up, you know, he's in leadership there. And, and so not just because I believe in the mission, but I believe in the people and I, I continue to root for them. And also just to quite literally send people their way, like to share the resources and highlight the campaigns.

And you know, it very much changed my life and I'm thankful for that chapter. I'm thankful that it's, the organization's still going. And I think I'm, I'm trying to figure out what it looks like to be an individual maybe again, you know, to, to how to, how to be about mental health and compassion and empathy and encouraging people.

But, but trying to figure out how to do that as an individual now.

Evan Rosa: So much of your work has been sort of being with others in their pain. And, and we've, we've spoken about this already in our conversation: how do we give people their pain in a way that legitimizes it? How do we bring our own pain into that conversation to help in the process of healing, but also eventually help a person write love on their arms instead of the kind of self hatred and I think the kind of self degradation that undergirds so much addiction and mental illness and, and suffering in the world.

Jamie Tworkowski: I think the first thing that comes to mind is vulnerability. You know, that we can lead by example, we can be willing to show people our pain, our questions, our grief. And I think also we can lead by example in not just stopping there, not just saying, "oh, woe is me life ,is so hard," but I love to encourage other people to go to counseling as someone who has benefited from going to counseling, and as someone who continues to benefit from this professional help piece. So, and then with that, we, we can't control anyone else and that's a really hard one, right?

I could make, you could make the perfect speech to someone we're concerned about. And we can't make them get it. We can't make them take us up on our advice. We can only continue to show up and to do our best to offer a mix of wisdom and compassion. You know? So that's a, that's a challenge I think that we have to name, but the hope is that we would keep doing the work. We would keep being vulnerable. Cause I think oftentimes there's this assumption that how do I get them to talk about it? Right? How do I get my friend or my, this person I love who's hurting. I need them to open up and we forget that we can break the ice by like that, that when I talk about my depression, it gives someone else permission to talk about their struggles, you know, and, and I think when I talk about recovery or healing or how professional help has been helpful to me, the hope is it plants the seed and it makes it easier for the next person to take similar steps.

And I also think like, you never know when you might break through, you never know when your words, your advice, your concern, your compassion might, might break through and where that, the day that light bulb goes off. And so we probably, you know, you don't want to beat someone up all day every day, but the hope is that we would keep showing up that we would keep reminding people that we love them, that we're here for them, we want the best for them. We want healing for them. And. Yeah. So I, I, I think it's, it's about maybe that balance.

Evan Rosa: Yeah. I wanna ask you about this, this phrase that you attribute to Renee. I, I wanted to, I mean, this, this jumped out to me as a really deeply moving and also very insightful part of the story, that original piece that you wrote.

Jamie Tworkowski: Hmm. I'll start by saying, I haven't read these words in a while. I haven't thought about this in a while. I like it. "The stars are always there, but we miss them in the dirt and clouds, we miss them in the storms, tell them to remember hope. We have hope."

So. Yeah. You know, I, I agree with how you set it up. This idea that I think we're aware that stars are always there, but there's many, many nights that they're not visible, right.

Based on what's in the way, based on obviously clouds and maybe that applies to truth. Maybe that applies to hope. You could certainly apply it to faith, right? Like, is this loving God always there, you know, is this God who created me and wants to know me and made me with a purpose? Is this God truly, always there even when, when God feels distant or I'm not looking or whatever, the, whatever the multitude of barriers might be. Yeah, it's interesting. I haven't, I don't know that I've been asked about it. There's there's the element of time where that was 16 years ago. So anything it's just interesting to reflect on a moment from that, that long ago, but that stood out back then, you know, enough to try to capture and share.

And, you know, Renee is still alive. She has a way with words and she's a really unique gifted person. And so it, it doesn't surprise me that this quote would be attributed to her. And I, I think too, it, it, maybe the idea of not just living based on what we feel in any given moment, you know, but what are the, the truths that we come back to.

Evan Rosa: For those struggling with, with wanting to see those stars, but really being lost in the clouds, those who are feeling really deeply, even in this very moment, what is your message to them?

Jamie Tworkowski: The message first off would be to stay in this life, that we need you here and to offer the belief that it will be worth it to stay. And that it doesn't mean stay where you are, stay in your pain, stay in the current circumstance--the hope would certainly be to journey through it and, and to arrive at a day when, when things feel different and, and when life is easier and more enjoyable and more comfortable and to acknowledge the work that it might take and, and what a challenge it might be to get there, but to, to invite someone, to take that journey, believing it's worth it. And specifically that it's worth whatever professional help that might require.

There's some simple examples. If, if your car's giving you trouble, you want to get to a mechanic because they know how to fix, fix your car. If, if you break your leg, you want to get to a hospital because there are people there that know how to fix broken legs. And I, I love the idea of approaching mental health, mental illness in the same way that, hey, there are people who know how to help, who want to help, who are available to help.

And, and then to go beyond that and not just invite someone into professional help, but, but to believe that we're all made for connection; that you deserve relationship, you deserve real friends. And for some, for some people that comes easy and for other people, life is lonely. And I think many people feel invisible or close to invisible and they wonder if they matter.

And again, I wish it was easier to find, but I, I love to at least invite people to remember and believe that, hey, you deserve connection. I, I think we all deserve a support system. Again, we've talked about it a lot today, but people who know and love us. And I, we touched on surprises earlier, but I believe that not only for myself, but for other people that I want to stay for the surprises.

And I hope that other people, in this case the listener who might be struggling, I hope that you would stay for the surprises: to be surprised by life, by love, by joy, by God; that there would be moments that you will experience and, and as a result, be so glad that you chose to keep going, that you chose to stay.

And I do think it's important to remember that most things will change. Our feelings will change our situations, our circumstances, not all the time, but that oftentimes if, if we can make it through, this storm will eventually pass something, will shift. Your feelings, your perspective, opportunities may arise, you may meet someone else. You may fall in love again. And so to give yourself time and, and to, to give I think life time to unfold, but all of that is, is just believing that life is worth living.

Evan Rosa: Jamie, thanks so much for your time.

Jamie Tworkowski: Thank you for having me.

Evan Rosa: For the Life of the World is a production of the Yale Center For Faith and Culture at Yale Divinity School. This episode featured author Jamie Tworkowski. I'm Evan Rosa, and I edit and produce the show. For more information, visit us online at faith.yale.edu. New episodes drop every Saturday, sometimes midweek.

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